And so once more I come to what might be termed the “seventh-inning stretch” of my novels. Time out, ladies and gentlemen.
I ask in a variation of a theme I have harped on now for four years: Who killed the two horsemen in the arena of the Colosseum?
You don’t know? Ah, but really you should. The whole story is now before you: clues galore, I give you my word; and when put together in the proper order and the inevitable deductions drawn, they point resolutely to the one and only possible criminal.
It is a point of honor with me to adhere to the Code. The Code of play-fair-with-the-reader-give-him-all-the-clues-and-withhold-nothing. I say all the clues are now in your possession. I repeat that they make an inescapable pattern of guilt.
Can you put the pieces of the pattern together and interpret what you see?
A word to the small army of well-intentioned hecklers who worry the life out of the author each time he blithely lays down a challenge. The contents of the telegram which in the story I send to Hollywood, and the contents of the reply thereto, are not necessary to your logical solution. As you shall see, a solution is possible without knowledge of either; they are merely confirmation of logical conclusions arrived at from analysis. So that actually you should be able to tell me what my telegram said!
— Ellery Queen